


we owe it to her to try

by bishopsknifetrick



Series: avengers: endgame fix-it fics [3]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Fix-It, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, only mentioned - Freeform, they did her so dirty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-04-30
Packaged: 2020-02-10 13:22:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18661255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bishopsknifetrick/pseuds/bishopsknifetrick
Summary: (Avengers: Endgame spoilers ahead.)Tony stares at Steve for a minute, then he looks up at the statue. It’s a beautiful thing, showing Natasha in her prime. She holds her batons—the Black Widow’s Bite—at her side, and she stands tall, confident, and proud. She has her head turned slightly to the side, and she emits an air of nobility, dignity, and glory. Chin up, eyes forward, one foot in front of the other. Just as she was in real life.





	we owe it to her to try

**Author's Note:**

> unbetaed. let me know if you spot a mistake.

_Two years ago._

_A small group of people surrounds a plot in the field behind the New Avengers Facility. The buildings are still being reconstructed after the devastation of the battle against Thanos and his troops, and the grass still struggles to grow, even despite the efforts to clear the field. This plot, though, is as clean as they could get it—in the middle of the group, two men lower a sapling into the hole they’ve dug out and plant it as neatly as they can. Another finishes installing a plaque in front of the sapling that simply reads a name and two dates._

_The sky is grey. The clouds are thick and heavy, and it isn’t raining, but the smell of rain permeates the air. A storm is about to break out—and the group is barely keeping it together for the sake of their fallen sister._

_The Avengers didn’t throw a huge funeral. She was a private person and, even disregarding that, they were only comfortable crying in front of each other, so informing the world right away that a hero had died was not an option. The remaining four original Avengers are separate from the others, separate from their new members—they stand closest to each other, closest to the sapling, closest to the soul they couldn’t retrieve._

_“We didn’t even get to bury her,” Clint murmurs. He takes a step back from the sapling, twists a necklace between his fingers. There’s a charm on it—an hourglass symbol. “We didn’t…”_

_“I tried to bring her back when I went to return the Stones,” Steve says, “but we can go back again.”_

_“Do you think she’d like what we’re doing?” Bruce asks._

_“This oak will live at least a couple hundred years, if you take care of it,” Thor reassures him, looking down at the plaque. He rubs his thumb against his eye and shakes his head. “No one will forget her this way.”_

_“I feel like it’s not enough,” Clint says, staring at the sapling with empty eyes. “She isn’t—the world doesn’t know. No one knows. I’m the only one who saw her go.”_

_“We know, Clint. We’re trying. I promise.” Steve tries to comfort Clint in the best way he can, tries to take charge, but without thinking, he knows he can’t do it. Not anymore. This is supposed to be Natasha’s job—it feels wrong to act in her stead. It feels worse when he’s crumbling on the inside over her as well. But Clint—Clint saw her die. Saw his best friend die. He can’t imagine what the archer’s going through._

_“No,” Clint says sharply. “No, I need more than a promise. Do you—the look on her_ face, _Steve, if only you saw it—she had accepted it, but she looked so scared, so vulnerable at the same time. Do you know what she said? When she was dangling off the cliff, holding onto my arm? ‘Please let me go.’ And I had to. She wouldn’t let me. It was, it was supposed to be... It was—”_

_Clint breathes out, his voice ragged and shaky, and he swallows down his next words as he slowly sinks to the ground in front of the sapling. Bruce stays silent, but he looks at Clint with an empathetic face. They’ve all lost a family member, and they couldn’t even mourn her properly until after they made sure everyone else was safe._

_“It was supposed to be me.”_

 

Steve walks alongside Tony, taking him down the path to the memorial in the front of the New Avengers Facility. They’ve been talking for half an hour; the aftermath of the battle, how the world’s been healing, what the Avengers have been doing while Tony’s been resting in an unwakeable state. It’s not what Tony expected, and it’s a little overwhelming to wake up after spending two years in a coma when the last thing you remember is being the most powerful living thing in the universe, but so far he’s been managing. Tony looks up at the memorial from his wheelchair through his sunglasses, then at Steve.

“Did you even try getting her back?” Tony asks.

“I did,” Steve murmurs, his jaw set. “I spent most of my time trying to get her back. Vormir wouldn’t let me have her.”

“You had all the time you needed. Days, weeks, even,” Tony presses, sighing heavily. “You said it only took you hours to return them all.”

“You don’t understand,” Steve says, pausing to unclench his teeth and take a breath. “It wasn’t like there’s a staircase to the bottom. I tried climbing down, but no matter how much further I went, she always seemed to be the same distance away as when I was at the top.”

“That’s im—“ Tony shuts himself up before he finishes the sentence. Time travel was supposed to be impossible. Him living is supposed to be impossible. Nothing surprises him anymore. “How?”

“I went to return the stone, but we still had to... She still traded her soul for it. We still used it. I even took Clint with me about six months after I first took the stones back, then I took Bruce, see if I was looking at it wrong the first time, but...” Steve shakes his head and looks down.

Tony stares at Steve for a minute, then he looks up at the statue. It’s a beautiful thing, showing Natasha in her prime. She holds her batons—the Black Widow’s Bite—at her side, and she stands tall, confident, and proud. She has her head turned slightly to the side, and she emits an air of nobility, dignity, and glory. Chin up, eyes forward, one foot in front of the other. Just as she was in real life.

There is a multitude of flowers at her feet and on the ground at the base of the statue. Someone burned candles here not too long ago, smoke slowly drifting off the wicks. It’s been two years, but the world doesn’t stop mourning a lost hero that quickly.

_Natalia Alianovna “Natasha” Romanova,_ the plaque reads. _The most talented spy and assassin in the world and a founding member of the Avengers. In giving her own life in return for one of the Infinity Stones, she did what was necessary to bring back the Vanished. Here, she stands to inspire courage in the hearts of everyone who walks upon these grounds and to remind everyone that the undoing of the Decimation did not come without great loss._

_The universe owes Romanova an insurmountable debt—_

_Trillions of souls for one._

_1984–2023._

Tony wants to reach out and touch her name, but he can’t reach from his chair and not when the flowers, so bright and fresh, cover the few more feet he has to go to Natasha’s statue. He sighs, tilting his head ever so slightly as he drinks in the details of the statue. Whoever carved it did a good job, but nothing compares to her when she was still here. Nothing ever will.

“She was the first one I knew,” Tony says, “She didn’t want to get close to anyone. She was afraid to. But she let her guards down, eventually, and.”

“She paid the price for it,” Steve sighs, a feeling in his chest swelling as he remembers Natasha. “Clint was so broken up over it. Wouldn’t talk to us for months outside of work. I don’t blame him—he was there when she...”

“Yeah.”

“It didn’t have to be her.”

“Yeah. But it was her anyway. It didn’t have to be, but it was.” Tony wheels his chair a few inches closer, rereading her name over and over. Natasha was like a sister to him. She’s one of the people he considers family. They couldn’t bring her back because, what, she didn’t die from the Decimation, or during the battle? She died alone.

Time travel used to be impossible. It used to be. Tony living was supposed to be impossible. The stones nearly killed Thanos—it should’ve killed Tony. He’s only human. But maybe that’s what keeps him alive; humans are so stubborn. Steve still came to him five years after the decimation to rope him into a plan he wasn’t even sure would work. They still fought Thanos the first time, even though that would have meant certain death. He still tried to keep the Avengers together, even though everyone was dead-set on their views.

Maybe it isn’t stubbornness. Maybe it’s determination, persistence, resoluteness.

So maybe he’s only human, but it was enough to keep them alive. Maybe it’s enough to get Natasha back.

“Take me to the labs. You guys couldn’t bring her back while I was in a coma. Well, I’m awake now,” Tony says, turning his chair. He looks over his shoulder at Natasha, his sunglasses gleaming.

“We’ll bring her home. I’ve gotta try.”

**Author's Note:**

> that concludes the initial fix-it fics i had planned for endgame. if you'd like me to fix another part of the movie, or you want me to explore the fix-its i've already done, then let me know.


End file.
